QPA says taxes unfair

by Patrick Reynolds



Materials producers hit out at proposals for implementing an aggregate tax in a report last week to Customs and Excise.

The report by the Quarry Products Association (QPA) warns that the tax proposals are unfair, would warp the market and it concludes that there is "no balanced environmental case to support aggregates taxation."

Customs and Excise would operate the Government's aggregates taxation system, should the environmental penalty plan go-ahead. The agency issued a consultation paper in June on its proposals for running the tax system in June.

But the proposed tax may not go-ahead. Early research was slammed as biased and unreliable, and the Government invited the quarrying industry to suggest an alternative set of economic tools to mitigate environmental damage. The QPA's anti-tax proposals have yet to be submitted to the Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions.

The QPA's response to the Customs and Excise consultation says the tax proposals are flawed because they focus on the end use of the material and not environmental impact. It says that major uncertainty lies with the agency apparently restricting the scope of the tax to only construction aggregates.

The report hits out with four key complaints:

l There is no established relationship between the tax proposals and environmental impacts.

l Tax proposals do not allow for different environmental operations standards between quarriers

l The tax proposals ignore the use of aggregates in environmental improvement schemes

l Recycling of aggregates exceeds Government targets.